She did what she deemed her duty towards Aurora, generous and bland, "More courteous, than was tender." Sometimes, however, fearful "That God's saints Would look down suddenly and say, 'Herein Of speaking angrily to any child, Since love, she knows, is justified of love." Aurora was a manageable child : "Why not? I did not live to have the faults of life; There seemed more true life in my father's grave She was subjected to the ordinary training of young girls-studied arithmetic, geography, and grammar; the creeds, from Athansius back to Nice: "The articles-the tracts against the time; Dances the polka and Cellarius; Spun glass, stuffed birds, and modelled flowers in wax ; To prove, if women do not think at all, They may teach thinking, "And last, I learned cross-stitch, because she did not like Romney, her cousin, when he returned from college, was her friend and companion. He was rich, talented, had much of the genius of Aurora, but was taken up with generalities and systems, and tangled in the meshes of socialism. Their lives were not set to the same music; of course he fell in love with her, but was rejected. Sorry girl! what a good match it would have made, looking from the standpoint of her maiden aunt and any one's maiden aunt. was in love with art-with life, which was her art. "Why, sir, you are married long ago, You have a wife whom you love, Your social theory." He, She Already had Aurora been communing with her own heart and nature. She had felt the dawning of a "new life within her life." She had read, by stealth, the books, bad and good, found in the garret of the old manse of her fathers. She had fallen upon the poets and drank their nectar, as of one of the gods and had written verses-such as young poets write : "Oh happy mornings, with a morning heart "So, like most young poets, in a flush But it was not always so, nor yet, we think, long. A nature like hers would find enough within to satisfy the demands of her art. It was natural enough for one, just waking from the conventional life about her, to imitate the life, or forms of life, into which she had entered. You see her now, looking out from her green room, upon the trees and shrubbery-stealing out before day from the sleepy house, and taking her fill of the sweet breath of morn, and drinking inspiration from the hills and woods, Of nightingales all singing in the dark, And rosebuds reddening where the calyx split. Early in the morning of this day, "Till my aunt awoke To stop good dreams," she went out in the open air to keep her birth-day, and sauntered through the acacias and over the dewy grass, to crown herself "in sport, not pride” "to learn the feel of it, Before my brows be numb as Dante's own VOL. V.-NO. IX. 10 She chose, not the bay, being not overbold, nor yet the myrtle "Which means chiefly Love; and Love Is something awful, which one dure not touch Nor yet the verbena, nor guilder rose "Ah! there's my choice-that ivy on the wall. But thinking of a wreath! I like ivy; bold to leap a height, 'Twas strong to climb.' Thus, speaking to herself, half singing it : "Because some thoughts are fashioned like a bell, Thus drawing a wreath, drenched with dew, across her brow, half blinding her with its tears, she, It was here, and with a blush of flame, she stood transfixed, in presence of her cousin "You, my cousin." The passages which describe this unexpected interview no one but a poet could write. We must transcribe a few of them; but, to feel their force and beauty, the scene itself must be read and studied. To show the intense aspirations 'of the heroine, take the following: "I would rather take my part With God's dead, who afford to walk in white, For fear to soil my gown in so much dust." He twits her on the art she has chosen, and reminds her how many have failed, and that she ought not to be satisfied -will not be-with the half praise bestowed on she answered: "Mere woman's work." "I would rather dance At fairs, on tight ropes, till the babies dropped To men who act and suffer. Better far Pursue a frivolous trade, by serious means, Of her "sublime art," she says: -"Poets become such We have said Aurora Leigh should not be read, but studied deeply, meditatively. We know of no better work for the youthful mind, filled with lofty aspirations, to pore over, than this. If one wishes to know the stuff that poets are made of, the things that they endure, the struggles to reach a purer life, the patience and the toil to attain it, the self-abnegation needful, the world of thought and feeling to which they are admitted, ere they see in the desert the sphynx with sober face, the sounding of that desert ere they catch a full sight of the presiding spirit which dwells there, the failures, the praise-which means scorn, the blame which is often the highest praise, the self-reliance in a world where none can stand alone, let them read Aurora Leigh! "I worked with patience, which means almost power. I did some excellent things indifferently, The latter loudest!" "I ripped my verses up, And found no blood upon the rapier's point; The heart in them was just an embryo's heart, Which never yet had beat, that it should die ; Of the English public, she says: "I apprehend this In England, no one lives by verse that lives; And weekly papers, holding up my name, We have written thus far, and felt consciously how little we have said to give proper expression of our sense of the merits of this poem, or to afford the reader a just appreciation of it. The quotations we have made were not selected because they were the gems alone to be found in the book, but to illustrate, rather, certain principles found in it, and to show how poets are made, and what food they live on. The prac tical geologist, who finds a grain or two of gold, or piece of quartz containing the precious metal, does not pronounce his judgment on the wealth which lies beneath the placer, much less does he regard the small treasures he has found a safe criterion to judge of the mines, which might contribute wealth enough for a hundred Rothschilds. ART. IX.-1. Observations and Inquiries into the Nature and Treatment of the Yellow, or Bulam Fever, in Jamaica and at Cadiz; particularly in what regards its Primary Cause, and assigned Contagious Powers, &c. By EDWARD DOUGHTY, Member of the Royal College of Surgeons of London, and Surgeon to the Forces. London. 2. Practical Illustrations of Typhus and other Febrile Diseases. By JOHN ARMSTRONG, M. D. London: Longman & Co. 3. Relation Historique et Médicale de la Fièvre-Jaune, &c. Par M. F. M. AUDOUARD, M. D. Paris. THERE is every reason to believe, notwithstanding some slight recent reverses, that, before the September number of our journal has had time to appear, the rebellion will have been virtually suppressed. Scarcely any have doubted such a result, since the capture of New Orleans and Norfolk; even the rebels themselves seem to have come to the conclusion that their case is hopeless. North Carolina and Arkansas have lost no time in acting accordingly; the Lieut.Governor of the former and the Governor of the latter setting the authority of Jefferson Davis at defiance. It is needless for us to enter into any particulars in regard to these facts; they are sufficiently known in all their significance. And, while we write, the fall of Richmond is expected from day to day. True, it may hold out for weeks; but that its capture, sooner or later, is certain, those who sympathized most with the rebellion hardly venture to dispute. In the darkest days of the Republic, while the national capital seemed in hourly danger of capture, we had full confidence that, whatever might be the disasters of the present, the government would ultimately prevail. A lively, unwavering faith in the Federal power pervades all our articles on the subject. Before the war had commenced at all, we pointed out the case |